BAT Practice and Beau Geste

Great practice yesterday. We had some new fighters from Long Island, we had six people in armor, we had the scriptorium going on. I taught a nice beginning fighter class. On top of all that I won the Beau Geste. Lots of fun.

Except for some warmups with Everett, I only fought my fights in the torunament. I was pretty wiped out from Rock Climbing the day before, so I was beat. Also, that plus a now dead sword made some of my shots weak. But I had a good time.

My goal in all my fights was to concentrate on using my reach but not being wedded to it. I especially wanted to keep range on Bill and Everett. In bill's case I took his leg and then simply juked him and killed him. In everett's case I ended up taking his arm and then killing him. I did the same thing to Dougal. My kill of Oscad was classic: he hit my leg, I blocked and cut to his head with a downward stroke, my best kill shot these days.

The other thing I was working on was patience.

Farrod and Gui taught me Uther's pell drill (new to me) where you throw a series of two blow combinations at the six points of the pell, including double strikes, starting with the leg: so you strike leg/leg, leg/ribs, leg/head, leg/off-side head, leg/off-side ribs, leg/off-side leg, and then you proceed to the next point: ribs/leg, ribs/ribs, ribs/head, etc. Great drill. My beginners class we worked on stance, the snap, the two-step striking/waking drill, and the block/strike drills in five and six.

(reminds me, I should get the terminology right on that pell drill: it's 1/1, 1/4, 1/5, 1/6, 1/3, 1/2, 4/1, 4/4, 4/5, etc)

BAT

BAT practice was great today! I don't know how many fighters we had in armor. Nick is back from Sweden, Sir Angus' squire was here--he's going to Columbia. There was also me, Ervald, Richard Blackmoore, Oscad, Gui, Kasimir, Everet, Vasili--I'm probably leaving somebody out. Ed was here teching sword work.

I didn't fight too many fights. I fought Kaz, Richard, Oscad, Nick and Vasili. I was fighting them all pretty well. I tried to narrow my focus--now that I've been fighting with the kite for awhile, stopexpermienting and concentrate on a couple of thechniques that are working well. I'm mostly fighting sword foot forward in a closed high form, but stepping back on occasion into an open high form. It's working pretty well. My sword is ballanced more for the belatrix style, open high form however, and I might need to make a new one next week. My leg targetting was on today as well.

There are three weeks till crown so I'm stepping up my activity a bit (plus I gained two pounds last week). Yesterday I did pushups and crunches, and climbed a lot of stairs. Today I fought and did a bit of Yoga. Tomorrow I will go to the gym, hit the treadmill and do some light lifting. Or at least that's the plan. Next time in armor will be next Sunday at the Beau Geste. :)